Anxious Snoutlings crowded the path to the palace all the way to the foot of the hill. My household staff split to let the messenger pass. I leaned forward in my seat as he braked in the middle of the hall—
“We stand alone, my Chieftain—the Grayfangs refused your call to arms!”
The household erupted in curses and murmurs.
I swallowed. “I see.”
Grommo wiped his forehead. “We fought for them so many times.”
Predslava rambled incoherently beside me until she blurted, “I’ll kill that bastard!”
The rest of the room seemed to agree.
“Wait,” I said. “We can’t afford another enemy right now.”
“What shall we do, Chieftain?” Grommo asked. “Only six hundred of our veterans are fit to lift a spear. Do you think that’s enough to beat the harpies?”
Others asked questions as well, a lot of questions.
“I don’t know.” I shook my head and pushed myself to my feet. “I only see what’s in front of me.”
They turned to me in silence.
I took my staff, climbed upstairs, then glanced out of the balcony.
More than ten thousand Snoutlings gathered there; a lot on paper, but my levy policy ensured that families always sent their three most capable male relatives to war, many of whom were no longer among us.
Elderly, nursing women, children, a number of them still carrying their working tools. They all looked up at me apprehensively, waiting for my final answer.
So, I touched the parapet and did my job.
“I know I’ve called your sons to war less than a harvest ago. I know… you haven’t had time to mourn them.” My nails scraped against the ice. “But I must call you again, for I do not know what other tragedies, like that of Fjallsleidis, may befall us if we do not fight!”
The crowd muttered amongst themselves.
I struggled to face them and was about to turn when someone stepped ahead of the crowd. They slowly lowered their voices, for she was a female Snoutling with a baby strapped to her back.
“I have no sons left, other than this one.” She patted the baby’s head.
My breath caught.
What have I done…?
“But—” She raised her rake and turned to the crowd. “I’ll fight for the Chieftain myself if she needs me!”
What…?
The crowd nodded.
An elderly janitor raised his mallet. “I’ll fight for the Chieftain!”
One by one, they raised their tools or fists.
“Kill them all!” another said.
“Death to the harpies!”
I stepped back in disbelief as the palace grounds burst—
“DEATH!!!”
My ice walls trembled with their war cries.
“I see.” I walked away from the balcony, dizzy.
Grommo followed me. “Your orders, Chieftain?”
“Assemble the levy again, Grommo.” I wiped my running nose. “And give that woman’s family exemption from military service for life.”
None of us wanted to return to Fjallsleidis so soon, but it was the fastest route to the harpies, and we had no time to lose. Teeth groaned all around me as we marched through the plundered village—like hungry warhounds, the Snoutlings were out for blood.
The messenger we sent to Bjornhavn pointed east as the mountains came into view. They didn’t seem as pretty to me now.
No sign of the harpies.
“Their settlement is deeper into the mountains, closer to the coast,” he said.
Natural paths here and there could take us higher, but entering unfamiliar terrain seemed risky, especially when our enemies could fly.
I ordered us to move.
We marched near the border, taunting them and making noise for hours, until feathered heads popped over the closest peaks.
The levy halted, nearly a thousand strong again, although filled with green recruits—we kept them behind the veterans. They nudged restlessly toward the mountains, thirsting to charge the harpies.
“Wait!” I said. “I know how you feel, but do not leave the formation no matter what.”
The strays returned to the group, however grudgingly.
Those must have been scouts.
We needed the whole army.
I ordered the Snoutlings to make camp. We spent the night in the open for all to see. I didn’t sleep in case I had to cast an emergency spell. Most of the Snoutlings didn’t close their eyes for long either, even though I told them to take turns resting.
The sun washed over the mountains, revealing a plethora of winged silhouettes perched upon the rocks.
“They came.” I stood up and began to count.
One hundred, four hundred… three hundred? No, this isn’t right.
Counting proved impossible—the enemy scattered, kept flying, then dipped behind the peaks again. I never knew whether I was counting the same flock twice or what.
There could’ve been anywhere between a few hundred and a few thousand.
They alighted on the rocks and hissed at us in unison. Ahead of the harpy mob stood a slender one with purple feathers. She tilted her head with a grimace, seemingly annoyed to see us, then let out a deafening screech.
Their chieftain…?
A wave of harpies flapped their wings at that sound and swept down from the heights.
The Snoutlings scrambled to form up in front of the camp.
“Harpoons!” Grommo cried.
They yanked bone-tipped fishing harpoons off the ground.
He ran a few steps ahead and hurled his own. “Loose!”
The rest followed, showering the incoming flock with them.
Harpies screeched and plummeted from the sky with their wings punctured.
“Spears!” he cried, bracing for impact.
The enemies spread their claws and dove in, harassing our formation from all sides. I stayed back to oversee the messy battle when a brave harpy split from the flock and tried going for my neck.
“Rraaa—”
Predslava raised her paw and swatted her down with a chuckle. “Silly birdie.”
I raised my staff to relieve the levy with a spell, but the surviving harpies flapped their wings and fled back to the mountains before I could.
The ground around our formation was a mess, wings spreading wide and hiding bodies, feathers and blood scattered everywhere. I couldn’t make sense of the casualties.
“Grommo!” I said.
He came over running. “Chieftain!”
“How are we looking?”
“We got more of them than they did of us,” he said.
Our fighters raised their spears and cheered.
The rocks were still packed with harpies, though. This was just a probe.
Grommo shielded his eyes from the sun. “What are they doing…?”
The harpy chieftain stared straight at me and hissed.
“They want us to go into the mountains,” I said.
“Should I get the levy moving? We did well in this fight.”
“No.” I shook my head. “It’s too risky. I don’t know how many harpies are still out of sight.”
“Then…” Grommo frowned at the peaks. “How are we going to get them down? Harpoons don’t go that far.”
“I’ll make them.”
“What—” He jumped back as I spun my staff. “Whoa.”
Cold air rushed into my lungs. Distant wings flickered in my narrowing sight. Ice crystals crawled along my staff as I pointed it towards the mountains.
“And…” Predslava giggled. “Boom.”
“Valkyries’—”
A freezing storm was unlikely to kill a winter bird—their bodies were adapted. But it was enough to ground them for a long time until the ice on their wings melted.
The air above the mountains glittered, though Valkyries’ Bane had already swept over them.
Dead harpies littered the plains, their feathers slick with ice, and their torsos punctured by spearheads. Their chieftain—the purple-feathered harpy—lay among the deceased.
We lost men too, shattered spears resting beside their bodies. So, it was hard for me to complain when their grieving companions decided to finish off our downed enemies. Still—
“Wait!” I said. “Let’s not do this.”
“Aw…” They held back their spears and gathered the harpies into a group of captives instead.
Grommo interrogated them, then dragged a battered, blue-feathered harpy before me and forced her to kneel. I remembered those feathers.
I glanced down at Predslava, but thankfully she didn’t seem to recognize her.
“Your name?” I asked in Nordic, since I didn’t know their language.
The harpy kept her head down, avoiding my eyes, until she muttered, “Varetrix.”
“Are you the new chieftain? Do you speak for all your people?”
She glanced at the purple harpy’s body. “I do now… I guess.”
“How many of you are still there?”
I was expecting a harder fight. Despite our casualties, we didn’t seem to have lost more than one-fourth of our levy.
“A few thousand? Maybe less,” she said bitterly. “My mother made sure to cull our numbers over the years.”
“I see. And was your mother responsible for pillaging our village?”
“No…” Varetrix said. “I was, in revenge for Bjornhavn. Do what you gotta do.”
The chieftain’s daughter was running the ring…?
Leif knew I would think twice before making enemies of a whole tribe.
Either way, many lives were lost because of that mess, and I was tired.
“You know…” I glanced at the mountains behind her. “My people would love me more if I climbed those mountains and did what you expect me to, but I won’t pursue further revenge.”
She lifted her head slowly. “What—”
“If you pledge not to bear arms against us ever again.”
Varetrix stared at me for a while, then nodded. “I do.”
“Say it out loud, please.”
She raised her voice. “I swear not to bear arms against you ever again!”
I wiped my nose and nodded.
A tribal oath was the best we could get. Occupying and managing a hostile population—worse, a different race—wouldn’t be a walk in the park, and a threat worse than the harpies now lingered in my mind.
The harpy rose and turned to leave, but her eyes widened as I swept down from the saddle and grabbed her vest.
“Because if you ever break your word, by the gods, I swear I’ll finish what your mother started!”
She froze, too terrified to speak.
I didn’t have it in me to commit this atrocity, of course, but judging by her face, I’d sounded convincing enough. I also suspected it was the only language this girl could understand.
I let go of her clothes. “You may go now.”
Grommo waved for the captives to be released. Varetrix and her harpies limped back to their mountains.
“Well fought, everyone,” I said, slumping back on the saddle.
The levy raised their spears. “Aye!”
They cut the dead harpies’ purses and scavenged the field for anything valuable—spoils of war, I couldn’t deny them that much—but found little in them. The harpies seemed quite poor.
“What do we do with our deceased, Chieftain?” Grommo asked. “Some men need to be tended to as soon as possible.”
I sighed. “Mass graves will have to do, then. Dig two separate ones and bury them.”
“Even the harpies…?”
I nodded. “This war is over.”
We returned to Nordrstjarna after covering the graves. Nearly six days of slow marching was a long time, and more Snoutlings perished on the way from their wounds, which reminded me why I never considered war as a first option for anything.
Winning battles was never enough.
Workers rushed to aid them as our pointed buildings came into view.
Grommo spoke up beside me. “Chieftain.”
“Yes?” I asked, lost in thought.
“I know how you feel about this, but now that the harpy business is over, and after everything the families have been through…” He glanced back, worried. “We might need to talk about the Grayfang arrangement.”
I was thinking about that.
“So we shall, Grommo.” I kicked off uphill with Predslava. “Please, gather the household.”
Feudalism was the very fabric of society in Vesmeria. Knights answered to lords, lords to bigger lords, and eventually to the Coven: a complex web of loyalties and interests, sometimes conflicting, but if anyone broke one of these sacred oaths, they threatened to raze the whole house of cards.
Since all these players had land, and therefore armies, the rupture wasn’t clean, but there was a process. First, one formally renounced their allegiance; then, Rihtwiderbryce, or plainly:
Legal rebellion.